Umpires: Max Scherzer's hand 'far stickier' than past cases

After a messy ejection of New York Mets ace Max Scherzer for allegedly using an illegal substance during Wednesday's start against the Los Angeles Dodgers, umpires defended their decision while dropping an interesting nugget. 

After the game, crew chief Dan Bellino and first base umpire Phil Cuzzi disputed Scherzer's insistence that the substance found was only "sweat and rosin." Rather, they concluded that the stickiness on Scherzer's hand far exceeded anything they had seen since MLB began its crackdown. 

"Both Phil and I touched his hand. As far as stickiness, level of stickiness, this was the stickiest that it has been since I've been inspecting hands, which goes back three seasons," Bellino said via the Los Angeles Daily News. "Compared to the first inning, the level of stickiness, it was so sticky that when we touched his hand, our fingers were sticking to his hand."

Cuzzi confirmed Bellino's account, adding that the umpiring crew gave Scherzer two chances to "clean it up." The three-time Cy Young winner continued to argue that it was only rosin. 

"I said this to Buck [Showalter] and to Max, it really didn't matter to us what it is," Cuzzi said. "All we know is that it was far stickier than anything that we felt certainly today and anything this year." 

A perturbed Scherzer vehemently denied the accusations. Following the Mets' 5-3 victory, Scherzer told reporters that he swore on his "kids' lives" that he wasn't using an illegal substance.